"We Have to Be Ambitious" | Portrait - Lewis Surdam |
Visions of Veritas | Aftermath of a Drug Bust |
Entente Ahead? | Six-Million-Dollar Man |
People in the News | The Undergraduate -Tying the Knot |
Brevia | Famous Friends |
Sports |
Rejoicing newlyweds Miriam Udel Lambert and David Lambert. |
I feel our exclusion in small, strange ways. Every day, I place calls to people in Harvard's telephone network. Repeatedly, I pick up the phone and dial the last five digits of the number-as anyone hooked up to that system can do. It's just a shortcut, the quick convenience of pressing two fewer buttons. But I am met only with the expectant crackle of the phone line; we are no longer linked to the network. It is a closed system, and now we are out of its loop.
This isolation, this feeling out of the loop, characterizes most undergraduate marriages, according to a number of Harvard students and alumni. Removed from the pulse of College life by both geographic distance and the different rhythms of married life, students have had to seek other support systems. For many, Dudley House has provided that support. Dean Dingman explains that the House, where he also serves as Allston Burr senior tutor, makes a concerted effort to include spouses (whether or not they are affiliated with Harvard), and Dudley activities are geared toward families with children.
Scott Ericson '94 and his wife, Suzanne, made Dudley the focal point of their social life. Although Scott was 44 when he started his studies here and Suzanne was working full time as head concierge at the Hotel Meridien, he "made a point of being active within Dudley House" and even chaired the House committee. Suzanne, who also made friends there, notes, "We had to create support systems and friendships more akin to our own situation. It was not the 'true' university experience, but it was worthwhile."
For other married undergraduates, that sense of connection comes from outside Harvard altogether. Michelle Hickman '94 and her husband, Troy '96, describe how they turned away from the College for social sustenance, relying instead on their church, work, and other friends who were Harvard graduates. "We felt very isolated," says Troy. "I came to know very few persons outside of my concentration because I didn't have the House system to facilitate such friendships." The Hickmans' detachment from campus was furthered by their living in East Cambridge, as Harvard property rents were prohibitively expensive. Two years of 15-minute bus rides and 10-minute bike rides "made Leverett Towers seem wonderful" to Troy in retrospect.
Harvard cannot fairly be expected to offset the financial burdens of independent living. According to director of undergraduate financial aid James Miller, the College's policy is to treat married students no differently from single ones in allotting financial aid: the responsibility for Harvard expenses is still borne by each individual set of parents. However, the couples themselves face special problems: the need for housing in or near Cambridge for 12 and not nine months a year, and the possibility that one spouse may be caring for children and thus unable to work.
In our case, with both of us enrolled, the housing costs for term-time just equal market rents off campus. The monthly rent for our one-bedroom apartment is $804-almost exactly what we would pay in College room costs for the 1996-97 academic year, a charge of about $400 apiece each month. It works beautifully, except that we have had to cover three months of summer rent as well.
Many married students feel the weight of emotional and psychological challenges more heavily than pragmatic obstacles. The demands of a marriage can divert energy from academic pursuits, and vice versa. Scott Ericson explains, "Marriage means another person who expects a quality relationship, while Harvard expects your blood and your first-born male child." However, it is not necessarily the specific academic demands that can threaten married life, but the pervasive intensity of the place. Such was the experience of Danette Engelman '95, an older student who came to the College married and left divorced. "It's hard to watch [your spouse] be accepted and immersed," she says of her husband, who was not involved in her daily student experiences. "Harvard affected us in recondite ways."
And for younger students who marry during their college careers, there is the burden of people's reactions. In addition to the families involved, students must contend with their peers', professors', and advisers' opinions. Those who knew David and me well recognized marriage as the natural culmination of our relationship. Initially, though, most of our more casual acquaintances were shocked.
Troy and Michelle Hickman also faced a number of discouraging reactions, which trebled when their first child was born during Troy's senior year. Young marriage and parenthood are uncommon at Harvard, Troy points out. "There was generally a look of thinly veiled disapproval or unbelief," says Troy, "a horror at the idea of being a parent and an undergraduate." When Michelle went to her House office and the registrar's office to change her name after the wedding, the women in both offices advised her strongly not to do so. The Hickmans grew skeptical about Harvard's professed goal of embracing diversity; according to Troy, the College "didn't care about any aspects of our lives apart from academics and career preparation."
Despite these impediments, a few students each year do choose marriage as undergraduates. As Dean Dingman points out, "Wonderful, sustaining relationships can begin at any point in your life." To this I would add: the love that wells up from those devoted relationships can inform and enhance every other aspect of students' lives. It can be focused so that it promotes academic, interpersonal, and spiritual growth. It can benefit the community and the families in which it blooms. Harvard can choose to be that community by adopting a more inclusive policy toward married students living on campus.
In the last paragraph of the handbook that the College sends to all parents of first-years, it advises moms and dads not to be alarmed if their children pursue unexpected paths at Harvard. The book reminds them that the children are now sailing their own ships, and that parents should "Come along...but keep in mind that it is a new voyage, someone else's voyage." To the extent that Mother Harvard is also an exacting parent, she should heed her own counsel and support the various courses that her children take, even when two of those courses converge.